(No, I'm not Jewish; that's not what I said! I'm about as White Anglo-Saxon Protestant as a person can be -- I'm printing a wonderful quote from Ben Stein!)
My confession:
I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was
Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those
beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees Christmas trees. I don’t feel threatened. I
don’t feel discriminated against. That’s what they are: Christmas trees.
It
doesn’t bother me a bit when people say, "Merry Christmas" to me. I don’t think
they are slighting me or getting ready to put me in a ghetto. In fact, I kind of
like it. It shows that we are all brothers and sisters celebrating this happy
time of year. It doesn’t bother me at all that there is a manger scene on
display at a key intersection near my beach house in Malibu . If people want a
crèche, it’s just as fine with me as is the Menorah a few hundred yards away .
I don’t like getting pushed around for being a Jew, and I don’t think
Christians like getting pushed around for being Christians. I think people who
believe in God are sick and tired of getting pushed around, period. I have no
idea where the concept came from that America is an explicitly atheist country.
I can’t find it in the Constitution and I don’t like it being shoved down my
throat.
Or maybe I can put it another way: where did the idea come from that
we should worship Nick and Jessica and we aren’t allowed to worship God as we
understand Him? I guess that’s a sign that I’m getting old, too. But there are a
lot of us who are wondering where Nick and Jessica came from and where the
America we knew went to.
In light of the many jokes we send to one another
for a laugh, this is a little different: This is not intended to be a joke; it’s
not funny, it’s intended to get you thinking.
Billy Graham’s daughter was interviewed on the Early Show and Jane
Clayson asked her "How could God let something like this happen?" (regarding
Katrina); Anne Graham gave an extremely profound and insightful response. She
said, "I believe God is deeply saddened by this, just as we are, but for years
we’ve been telling God to get out of our schools, to get out of our government
and to get out of our lives. And being the gentleman He is, I believe He has
calmly backed out. How can we expect God to give us His blessing and His
protection if we demand He leave us alone?"
In light of recent
events…terrorists attack, school shootings, etc. I think it started when
Madeleine Murray O’Hare (she was murdered, her body found recently) complained
she didn’t want prayer in our schools , and we said OK.
Then someone said you
better not read the Bible in school. The Bible says thou shalt not kill, thou
shalt not steal, and love your neighbor as yourself. And we said OK.
Then Dr.
Benjamin Spock said we shouldn’t spank our children when they misbehave because
their little personalities would be warped and we might damage their self-esteem
(Dr. Spock’s son committed suicide). We said an expert should know what he’s
talking about. And we said OK.
Now we’re asking ourselves why our children
have no conscience, why they don’t know right from wrong, and why it doesn’t
bother them to kill strangers, their classmates, and themselves.
Probably,
if we think about it long and hard enough, we can figure it out. I think it has
a great deal to do with "WE REAP WHAT WE SOW."
Funny how simple it is for people to trash God and then wonder
why the world’s going to hell. Funny how we believe what the newspapers say, but
question what the Bible says . Funny how you can send ‘jokes’ through e-mail and
they spread like wildfire but when you start sending messages regarding the
Lord, people think twice about sharing. Funny how lewd, crude, vulgar and
obscene articles pass freely through cyberspace, but public discussion of God is
suppressed in the school and workplace.
Are you laughing?
Funny how when
you forward this message, you will not send it to many on your address list
because you’re not sure what they believe, or what they will think of you for
sending it.
Funny how we can be more worried about what other people think of
us than what God thinks of us.
Pass it on if you think it has merit. If not
then just discard it… no one will know you did. But, if you discard this thought
process, don’t sit back and complain about what bad shape the world is in. My
Best Regards.
Honestly and respectfully,
Ben Stein
Amen
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